The air pollution episodes in Delhi and surrounding area is continuing for several years. Exceptionally high particulate matter concentration is causing thousands of deaths, increasing premature mortality and causing financial damage. However, while the political parties are blaming each other people cries for action. Let’s talk about the reason behind this terrible air quality.
To begin with, WINTER. Recall there is something many refer to as convection that help to blend things up. In nearness of daylight warm air ascends and blend in with cold air. So does the poisons. In summer this blending happens quite well however in winter, as the temperature is low, contaminations doesn’t blend quite well and remains at the lower height. Along these lines, essentially, its not with Delhi alone, the majority of the spots show higher contamination in winter and lower in summer.
Second, WESTERN DISTURBANCE. Normally begin over Mediterranean Sea, this brings cold air and water fume over the country’s capital. Presently low wind speed, great measure of dampness and low temperature. An ideal formula for haze. The contamination can not disseminate rather it traps over Delhi.
Third, NO RAIN. Downpour is great as far as contamination likewise as it cuts down poisons alongside it. Despite the fact that western unsettling influences gets downpour to a few city winter however Delhi typically gets nothing. Albeit an overwhelming shower can improve air quality as we saw in Jan,2017 when a substantial shower bring air quality down to direct from extremely poor.
Fourth, ROLE OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA. OK!! presently this is something dubious. For airborne researcher, it is exceptionally testing to recognize nearby discharge and shipped outflow. Yes,definitely rural buildup consuming over Punjab and Haryana, contributed in the contamination over Delhi however how much!! Source distribution of particulates over Delhi recommend that 30% of those particles are originating from consuming. Most of particulate issues are originating from vehicles, street dust re-suspension, control plants and so forth. Presently, the consuming in Delhi and consuming in Punjab and Haryana both add to the contamination trouble over Delhi. In addition, If you think about Punjab and Haryana, you will at present discover the particulate level (PM2.5) is twice as lower contrasted with Delhi.
Fifth, DIWALI. Indeed, Diwali has a job in winter contamination over Delhi. It pushes the particulate focus past an edge level from where it is hard to return to typical. This year(Due to wafer boycott) is the cleanest Diwali contrasted with the past multi year yet poor air quality record demonstrates job of nearby outflow and job of shipped crest from neighbouring areas like Gurgaon, Noida and Ghaziabaad.
Finally the reasons of high pollution over Delhi could be summarised as follows:
- Low/no dispersion.
- Accumulation due to fog trapping
- High local emission
- Long range transport from other states.
There is no one day solution for this. We need to know the sources and quantify them in a far better statistical way. Then only policies could be made and implemented.